Spiridonov M. Democracy as a socio-cultural phenomenon: general and specific considerations – Qualification scientific work on the rights of a manuscript.
Thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the specialty «033 – Philosophy». – Kyiv National University of Construction and Architecture of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, Kyiv, 2024.
According to the results of the study of democracy through the prism of socio-cultural realities, the position is conceptualized according to which ignorance of the specifics of the socio-cultural environment or for various reasons of neglect, ignoring the socio-cultural context of the democratic process dooms such a process to consequences that are far from expected, and sometimes categorically incompatible with them. This leads to a situation of double negativism: on the one hand, the concrete historical process of democratization fails, on the other hand, the idea of democracy in the trans-time dimension is discredited, its reputation as an effective tool for optimizing all spheres of public life is devalued.
The causal relationship is substantiated, according to which the achievement of the functional effectiveness of democracy implies its ontological status as an integral component, attribute and even imperative of worldview culture, because only in this case the automaticity of democratic norms and procedures at the level of everyday spontaneity, latency, automatisms and stereotypes of life is ensured.
A meaningful and criterial distinction of sociocultural reality is made between local sociocultural phenomena and factors (we are talking about the spatial and mostly ethno-national format of sociocultural ontology) and global sociocultural trends, which are distinguished by time, temporal, epochal characteristics – that is, they actually determine the sociocultural specifics of the era.
The significance of such a unique function of the democratic process as the restriction of power is revealed: it is in this function that the unique specificity of democracy is embodied, since any other type of governance operates on the principle of expansion – its goal is the power itself, power as such, and not the restriction of power.
The conclusion is conceptualized that a timely and effective response to shortcomings and abuses is a distinct conceptual criterion and a kind of litmus test, by means of which it is possible to correctly distinguish societies on the basis of their compliance with the canons of democracy.
The argumentation verdict was clarified, according to which the main advantage of implementing the participatory democracy model is a high level of legitimacy of those decisions that are made subject to its application. Broad political participation is the basis for the legitimacy of both individual decisions and state institutions as a whole.
The conclusion about the expediency of the semantic and functional positioning of democracy not as a final state but as a permanent process, within which practically all the shortcomings of democracy are subject to correction in principle under the conditions of their timely detection and qualified, civically responsible response to them, is substantiated. Unlike other forms of government and socio-political processes, democracy is able to improve itself and effectively solve its problems through its own inherent procedures and mechanisms.
The significance of an adequate understanding of democracy and the phenomena of democratic etiology is proved, namely: if, regarding the phenomenon of democracy, an inadequate, tendentious, demagogic, populist, etc. impression is created , then individual and collective efforts will be channeled along false and counterproductive directions that have nothing to do with real problems, and therefore cannot in principle serve as a means of achieving the goal of solving the real problems of both democracy itself and the problems of society, determined by the shortcomings of the applied application of the theoretical foundations of democracy.
Argumentatively and illustratively, the thesis is expressed that the prospects for the dynamic progress of democracy are significantly dependent on the factor of democratic culture as the cultivation of democratic principles, values, norms of perception of the realities of social reality. Unlike external democracy, which is formal, formalized, declarative, narrative, manifested, propaganda, memorandum, etc., internal democracy is immanent, authentic, inherited and assimilated at the level of socio-cultural stereotypes of world perception and automatisms of actions.
